Yoga has helped Johnathan Joseph’s flexibility

Johnathan Joseph didn’t want the civilians in his wife’s yoga class to know he was a professional athlete, but his wife let them know in advance.

“It was weird because there weren’t many guys like me in there,” Joseph said. “Most people were in their thirties or forties. It would start at eight in the morning. I would go to a class at 12. Sometimes I went back-to-back some days where it would be an hour and 50 minutes straight. For me, it was a struggle. It was new to me, some of the moves and things like that but they talked me through it and helped me out each and every day.”

Flexibility is important for Joseph, whose hips tightened up frequently last year as he unwittingly played through two sports hernias.

I asked Joseph if there were times last season when he watched himself on film and felt like that wasn’t him out there. As he talked through it, his answer changed.

“Not really,” Joseph started. “I played in about 13 games last year and out of those 13 games, in 11 of them, the guy didn’t have over 60 yards so it was kind of hard to argue with the production at the same time. There would be some games where you could see where I was taking two or three extra steps in my break, where I would usually take one step. With things like that, I guess the answer would probably be yes to your question.”

It was actually fellow starting corner Kareem Jackson who helped Joseph identify what was wrong with him last season. Jackson had a sports hernia in college and suggested to Joseph that was likely his issue. But Joseph ignored Jackson, played through it all season and even in the Pro Bowl. After returning from Hawaii, he saw a doctor in Philadelphia who said he did indeed have two sports hernias.

“I just kind of put it to the side because (I thought) if I’m good enough to practice, I’m good enough to play,” Joseph said.